Human Babysitter
by Prepare for the Noble War
Summary: Joss meets Godric just before his death due to a last request of his own before he turns himself over to the FOTS. He is also her first vampire. She never expected to make a friend of his and want to give up everything to help him, but that is exactly what she does when he asks her to watch over Eric in his absence. Only Eric doesn't know he has a new human babysitter. Eric/OC


**IMPORTANT AN: **This fic will be Eric/OC but the connection with Godric was important to me. It was also almost just a Godric one-shot, then almost a Godric fic, but NO. Now it's Eric, and my OC Joss. And she sees Godric as a FRIEND at the end of this chapter, so you can ship them but please don't give me crap for putting her with Eric later.

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**Chapter One**

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It was officially darker than any Dallas night that Joss had seen in her few months of living her. She looked up at the night sky through the glass ceiling of her dance studio. It was just far enough from the city lights to see stars, the moon a crescent in the sky. She took a deep breath and hiked her purse onto her shoulder, ready to leave for the night. Yet as she turned there was the sound of her heavy wooden doors opening.

Joss put on a smile, genuine as she met the eyes of the boy who had walked in. He looked young, was casually dressed, and pale. "Can I help you?" She asked lightly at the sad look upon his face.

"I'd like someone to dance with." He told her, smooth voice echoing in the empty dance studio.

Joss felt a strike of confusion go through her but ignored it. "I'm sorry, I don't hire out dancers, I just give lessons." She answered his request, shifting her weight onto one foot.

"I know." The boy responded calmly. "But I only want to dance once, now. I will pay ten thousand dollars."

Joss's mouth literally fell open, just a bit, in shock. For some reason his face, his words, his tone, it all depressed her. "Why?"

He seemed confused she would even ask. "I never have. It seems such an intimate thing and I have yet to find myself a proper partner. And I would like to dance before I meet the sun."

The purse fell from her shoulder. She was certain now that he wasn't a boy at all now. He was a vampire planning his own death. The first vampire she had ever met, and he was asking for nothing more than a dance before he died. Looking at him now, Joss couldn't help but see him as a lonely man, who never loved anyone, he nearly admitted it himself just then.

Joss didnt realize she hadn't moved or spoken until he said something. "I am sorry, I should have told you I was a vampire before I scared you." He apologized.

Joss shook her head and felt her cheeks grow wet. "No, it's not that. I would love to dance with you." She told him, trying to smile.

"Then why do you cry?" He seemed discouraged. "Are you sad?"

"Aren't you?" She retorted and wiped her face furiously.

All the evidence that she had never been more right showed in his following expression. "I'm Joselyn McMoore, by the way." She said as she gained her composure.

"Godric." The young looking vampire responded. Joss cod hear it now though, the age in his voice and name, the years past seen in his eyes. He was anything but young. "Shall we dance, Ms. McMoore?"

She smiled and held both her hands out for him. Godric approached her stiffly, cautiously, but took her hands none the less. Joss took gentle pity on his cluelessness as they got close, moving one of his hands to her waist where it was meant to go, and slipping her fingers right between his with the other hand. Then she held his shoulder, noticing he couldn't be more than an inch taller than her, and she watche his face.

Godric held a solemn expression for a while, but then his eyebrow lifted in question and his mouth turned down. "Should we not be moving? Isn't there meant to be music?" He asked when he fully came to realize Joss hand no intention of moving.

She took a breath, accidentally breathing in his scent. Like spice and dirt though he looked completely clean. "We can't dance yet, we are perfect strangers. You said yourself, dancing is intimate." She breathed out.

He didn't understand it. "Are we meant to speak, then?" He questioned further.

"Yes." Joss said and paused at his expression of bewilderment. Had she, for a moment, said something wrong? Done something wrong?

Godric then frowned and leaned closer into her, strength in his hand holding hers, his entire body hard as if a threat. "You don't seem afraid of me." His tone changed from kind or confused to harsh.

Joss felt her heart beat jump for a moment, indeed threatened at his almost entirely new personality, but it passed. "I'm not, unless your planning on doing something. Are to going to hurt me?" She asked in the same stern voice she used when asking her students if they practiced.

His facade fell and he looked upon her sweetly. "I shall promise not to. I'm not sure I could if I tried, as you interest me far too much."

"Good." Joss blurted and smiled at him. "And you interest me."

Godric just stared at her. After a while of silence Joss decided to talk. "So why do you want to meet the sun?" She asked quietly, slow in case he seemed angry with her, so that she could stop herself.

But he remained silent even after her question. At least for a few seconds. "I am very old and I am sincerely done with this world." Was his answer.

Joss could imagine the feeling. She had seen humans grow old saying they were ready to die, but none so willingly killed themselves. But it must be sad for him, as he wouldn't just grow old and be ready. He had to embrace death for it to come. If he wanted the peace of death then he had to be the cause, the prey of it as well as predator, and in all ways, _burning._ It sounded horrific.

"What about your friends? You have friends, you must. Don't you think that they will miss you?" She went on, trying to show that she wasn't insulting him by assuming he was alone. He seemed alone, but Joss didn't need to voice that opinion.

Godric may have unconsciously put some space between them, but he noticed the absence of her body heat at his slight shuffling of feet. "They will get over it fairly quickly, I am sure. For the most part, any way." He said, staring at open air behind her. "Though I worry for my progeny."

"Progeny?" Joss echoed in confusion.

He thankfully didn't seem exasperated or annoyed to answer the silent question. "Eric is in a way my son. I created him, as he is a vampire like me. A bond between maker and progeny is stronger than any human relationship I have seen save for maybe close parent and child."

She stayed silent for a moment. Godric voice really was full of worry. Joss felt she shouldn't have asked about it, so she decided to change the subject. "I don't know much about vampires, I'm sorry I asked. You're just the first I met."

Godric tilted his chin to look at her better. "I am surprised."

"Is that a good or bad thing?" Joss asked him.

"Good. It has been long since I have been surprised, and you seem extraordinarily calm despite the fact that I could kill you before you blinked." He watched as Joss blinked twice at the mention of it.

She frowned like a child and just met his eyes. "You promised not to."

For the first time, his lips twitched up into a light smile. Joss was innocently impressed at how much it changed his face, making him younger, sweeter, and so much more handsome. "I did, didn't I." He stated.

Then he readjusted his hand on her waist, taking a more firm grasp of her. She didn't speak because even the half inch difference of his hand had flustered her. Godric broke the silence without becoming aware of this.

"And what of you? Tell me how it is you came to dance." He asked her, as it was the only thing he really knew about her. That she danced, and it was her name under the instructor title of this studio.

Joss swallowed silently. "My mother was a proper rich girl, I suppose, dancing at black tie social events. Waltz, that kind of stuff. And my father was Cuban. He insisted that dancing was in our blood, we were born to salsa, even though he couldn't dance to save his life." She answered with a soft laugh at the end. "I wanted to be like them, so when they died I began dancing."

Godric seemed stricken. "I apologize. If I had known I wouldn't have asked." He seemed ready for her to cry, again, any second.

But she was smiling, shaking her head. "No, it's a happy memory. Not their death, obviously, but that I still have my parents. This studio is thanks to them, all the way, and I love to dance."

His expression match the one earlier, when she had surprised him about never meeting a vampire before. "You are impressive, for lack of a better word." Godric said under his breath and laughed to himself.

"How old are you?" Joss asked out of the blue, the question biting at her for quite some time now.

Godric stopped laughing, smiling, and thought for a moment. "Over two thousand years old, though the exact number escapes me. Time was not easily kept back then." He answered. "And how old are you?"

"Only twenty-five." She blushed.

"But a child and yet you own all this. I have yet to tell you how lovely your establishment is." Godric said, his eyes looking up at the skylight, mainly. Joss looked up as well, and the stars had only grown more beautiful. "I've become curious, Ms. McMoore."

The statement was odd as he pause. She felt the need to say something. "You can just call me Joselyn, or Joss." His attention returned to her face and she shrugged slightly. "Um, what are you curious about?"

His tone was serious. "If you had anyone intimate that you dance with." If only he had said it in the normal voice he had been, it would have given Joss ideas that he may actually be flirting. But he seemed too clueless to flirt.

So she just shook her head. "No. I teach class, but other than that I usually dance alone, or not at all."

"Then, it seems, that you may be just as lonely as I am." Godric told her, and Joss felt it, deeply. She wanted to deny it but she couldn't remember the last time she went out with her friends. "Parentless, childless, loveless. And nobody to share a dance with."

There was a familiar prickling behind her eyes but she just replaced sadness with a joking glare. "How do you know I'm childless?" She asked.

He leaned closer to her face, closer than she had been to a man in months, possibly more than a year, and he smiled. "You do not smell like a mother."

Joss couldn't help the small giggle that bubbled in her throat. He had just seemed so amused to say it, and had been so close, she found it funny. And then she remembered he was a vampire, that he was close, and uncontrolled nervousness strangled her laugh. She still wasnt scare of him, but the media had implanted so much fear in her mind that the more she thought of it the more she thought to get this one dance over with. Her grip loosened slightly of his shoulder, and her hand in his was limp, her eyes adverted in shame of herself.

"Joselyn, have I somehow offended you?" Godric asked her moments after he noticed her change.

She let out a half-sad, half-humored scoff. "No. I'm thinking. About how dangerous, how evil those church guys on TV make vampires sound. And I feel mean because that's all I've heard about vampires, but you're nice, and all I can think about is Newlin claiming your kind as the devil."

Her eyes then widened and she looked at him in surprise. "Not that I think that! Not at all. I always thought he was a delusional creep, and I believe in vampire rights fully, I just don't know a lot-" Her rambling was cut off as Godric's hand squeezed hers.

"Then pass judgement on me, and I shall be honest with you of the rest of my race." He suggested gently, soothing her nervous attitude and silencing her.

That seemed like a lot to ask of her. She knew nothing about him. Anything she said could be wrong and taken offensively. But he looked at her with almost a trust that she would do just fine, and a curiosity to know. Joss took her time before she began to speak.

"I think that you are kind, and alone, and it makes me sort of sad to look at you." She started admitting and watched his unchanging expression. "And you are truly threatening, I can't explain that, but only sometimes. If you want me to say it in terms of good and evil like the news tells everyone to think, I would have to say you were good but out of practice. Misunderstood."

Godric tilted his head down, no longer meeting her eyes.

"That is a wise description, but I am not sure if I can say my kind is any good. But you, Joselyn, should keep those views, but know that near half my kind truly is evil, and the rest are easily goaded." He lectured her. "We are monsters, we're not right, but there are some of us out there trying to change that."

Joss stepped away, hers hands falling, and as she left his reach, Godric's falling as well. He looked disappointed at the separation, but she smiled and walked towards her stereo. Neither said anything as she started up some slow music. Joss put the volume at a comfortable height and returned to Godric, holding her hands out again.

"I think we are ready to dance now." She told him as they resumed their position.

Godric looked at her as she pressed her body into his. "Why do you think so now?" He asked her.

The hand on his shoulder rubbed the ball of muscle reassuringly. "Because intimacy is mostly trust, and friendship. I trust you, and would love to call you my friend. If you think otherwise, by all means, let me know."

He smiled. "I trust you, and to have a human friend, in the end... I would be honored." Godric told her.

They began to move. Godric seemed to take the lead in a slow waltz, and Joss graciously followed his moves, not being analytical. This wasn't a lesson or performance. This was passion and trust, in a dance. Though he never danced, he must have spent many years watching others, as he glided her about the studio floor in effortless turns and small steps. It was the most fun Joss had ever had, dancing.

The song ended and the stereo stopped, several long minutes later. The stood motionless as it ended, until Godric separated from her to look down at her face. There were streaks of red blood coming from his eyes like tears, mirroring the tears that had appeared on Joss's own face.

"I am crying." Godric sounded shock and took his hands away to wipe at his face.

"So am I." Joss whispered and used her long sleeves to dry her flushed cheeks.

Godric was close the her again when she looked up. He leaned in and kissed her chastely, without passion but full of care. "Thank you, I never would have thought that in the end, it would be a human to do so much for me. We have danced, and cried, and made friends."

She laughed sadly, as his words elicited another sob from her. Godric placed on hand on her cheek with gentle assurance.

"I am sorry to have also brought this burden to you." He brushed away tears with his thumb.

"I'm sorry, I'll stop crying now." Joss sniffled and rubbed her face for a third time that night. "But I think I'll really miss you."

The vampire just smiled at her. "And I will miss you, but now I have to go."

She nodded. She didn't dare speak again as she already said she wouldn't cry anymore. Godric touched his forehead to hers before turning and leaving. By the door he pinned something to her bulletin board, and then in a blur he was gone. The breath caught in Joss's lungs and she ran to the door, stepping out, but seeing him nowhere. Vampires really were super fast.

Then she looked at the bulletin board. What he had pinned was a check, for ten thousand. Like he had promised, but now it only made Joss feel queasy. She unpinned it, and folded it up, but she didn't know how to deal with it. If she had remembered about the money, or had time to see him write it, she would have refused it. For now it went into her retrieved purse to be dealt with any day but today.


End file.
